Catalytic Model of Issues Management

The catalytic model of issues management explains how organizations can proactively initiate certain issues and stimulate the public agenda with the goal of managing an issue through its life cycle. Richard E. Crable and Steven L. Vibbert (1985) extended Barry Jones and Howard Chase's (1979) process model of issue management by proposing a catalytic model that maintains that organizations should not merely respond to developing issues and react to the strategies of others but should instead catalyze issue discussions as a means to achieve organizational goals.

The catalytic model segments issues into life cycles with five stages: (1) potential stage, when one or more individuals attach significance to a problem; (2) imminent stage, when many others accept a problem as a legitimate concern; (3) current stage, when the media widely disseminate information about an issue, making an issue a topic of conversation among many stakeholders; (4) critical stage, when an issue is ready for decision and groups argue for a resolution in their favor; and (5) dormant stage, when policy decisions on an issue have been made or an issue is “resolved.” Issues often resurface when new problems are identified, in effect restarting the issue life cycle again, at various stages.

The catalytic approach argues that organizations should not wait for potential issues to become salient to others to start managing them. There are three steps in catalytic issues management.

Situation Assessment. Issue managers need to take stock of potential outcomes that benefit profit or survival motives of the organization. Managers should examine how environmental conditions enable or constrain desired outcomes.

Goal Establishment. Organizations catalyze favorable policy by creating issues and effectively managing them to a desired outcome. Desired outcomes should be solidified into clear goals and objectives. Managers should identify what law, policy, economic, cultural, or informational factors need to change in order for organizational goals and objectives to become reality. Subsequently, managers should assess the potential positive effects of a change against potentially negative effects. If the potential positive effects outweigh the negative, managers determine if the organization can indeed catalyze the desired change through influencing the policy process.

Agenda Stimulation. An organization can work to establish an issue's potential with internal and external publics through tactics that explain the issue as justified and legitimate. Moving an issue to the imminent stage is accomplished by gaining the involvement and endorsement of other groups so [Page 101]that an issue becomes legitimized in the eyes of many stakeholders. Next, through agenda-building techniques and media relations, issue managers try to position and frame an issue in the mass media, helping it to reach the current stage and become part of the public agenda. In the critical stage, skills such as lobbying are needed to influence public policy and resolve an issue in a manner that benefits the organization.

As a long-term planning tool, the catalytic model enables organizations to initiate desired issue discussions rather than waiting for others to develop trends or favorable policy conditions. While initially conceptualized as a tool for business, research has widely recognized that all forms of organizations—corporate, government, nonprofit, or activist—can catalytically manage issues to their advantage.

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